


Once to Flame, Twice to Burn

by alilactree



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Heartbreak, Hopeful Ending, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Light Angst, M/M, Post-Break Up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-03
Updated: 2017-08-03
Packaged: 2018-12-10 16:48:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11695821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alilactree/pseuds/alilactree
Summary: You can’t do this, he’d wanted to shout as the elevator doors closed on Magnus, but Magnus had looked so sure. So determined. And the words didn’t come. Because Magnus can do whatever he wants. And what he wants is not Alec.2x18 reaction fic.





	Once to Flame, Twice to Burn

Someone calls his name. Alec doesn’t know who. It sounds as if it’s being shouted underwater. His feet are moving. He doesn’t know where. It doesn’t matter. 

His eyes blur, everything around him is swirling black mist, his lungs ache, his throat presses tight against his windpipe, he has to go, he can’t breathe, he can’t be here, he can’t, he can’t, _he can’t_ — 

_You can’t do this_ , he’d wanted to shout as the elevator doors closed on Magnus, but Magnus had looked so sure. So determined. And the words didn’t come. Because Magnus can do whatever he wants. And what he wants is not Alec.

Outside in a courtyard of silent stone statues and summer-yellowed grass, Alec presses back against a wall. It’s sun-warmed and rough and he lets it scrape too hard against his elbows and wrists and scalp. He wants to scream. He wants to rip his shirt at his throat so he can breathe. He wants to crumple into a heap and cry.

Instead he swallows hard and grits his teeth. Down, push it down. He used to be so much better at this; burying his hurt, his sadness, better at being resigned to never getting what he wanted. He’d let it harden around his heart like a cage of black obsidian, let it drive him to work harder, be better, become the perfect soldier. And then Magnus came along. Magnus never needed to chip away at Alec’s walls because he’d snapped them into oblivion as effortlessly as the magic that flicks from his fingers.

Alec forces himself to take one long, deep breath. His phone hums in his pocket with a text and he lets himself believe it’s Magnus before he can stop the thought. It’s Jace, asking, _Hey man, you ok?_ because he can feel through their bond that Alec is most certainly not.

His feet move in the moment just before Alec decides that he can’t stand there and let his heartbreak consume him, and that’s good, that means his instincts are taking over, that he doesn’t have to think much at all. He arrives in a training room, finds himself standing at a sparring dummy. He hits it once, then slips away almost entirely, only coming to with a shocked, hazy awareness when he leaves a smear of blood on the black leather. He doesn’t know how long he’d let his body take over, but his lung ache and his muscles burn and his knuckles are bruised and battered. When Alec licks his lips he tastes the salt of sweat and the sharper bitterness of tears intermingling.

“Alec.” It’s Izzy, coming cautiously up to him like he’s a feral shax demon. Alec holds up a hand to stop her from coming any closer. “Alec, we don’t have to talk about it,” Izzy says, a little less cautious now. “But you need to stop before you hurt yourself.”

Too late, Alec thinks. And he doesn’t mean the knuckle he busted open. Alec shakes his head, shakes her off, and stalks away to his room. He needs to get a grip, he needs to get control of himself, he has an institute to run he cannot give in to this, he is a _leader_ — 

_“But as a leader…”_

In his room, Alec sits on the edge of the bed he’s barely slept in for months now and stares at his bloodied, aching hand. He flexes his fingers open and closed, willing himself to move past the pain. Ignore it. Push it down. 

There’s a knock on the door, then the creak of it opening, and his mother calls his name. 

“Don’t,” Alec says, surprised at how broken his voice sounds. He clenches his jaw. Opens and closes and opens his hand. His mother sits next to him and he grits out, “Did you come here to tell me you were right about him?”

Maryse blinks at him. “By the Angel, Alec. Of course not.” She reaches for him, gathering him into her arms like he’s a little boy instead of the man who has towered over her for more than a decade now. 

A sob wrenches from Alec’s throat that he can’t stop and he gaps out, “I’m sorry.”

“Why?” she says, and rubs his back. The last time she did that he was very, very small. And it was unusual enough to remain a special, lingering memory.

Alec pulls away, shakes his head and swipes at his face. “I don’t know.” He’s learned how to question the things he’s always been taught, to trust his own gut beliefs. How to own up to his mistakes, admitting when he screws up and then making things better. All thanks to Magnus. 

He doesn’t know how to make this better. 

“I had hoped to spare you and your siblings from living through a time like this.” Maryse smooths out the skirt of her dress, her voice measured, but her eyes heavy with sorrow. “Things will be very difficult soon, Alec. Dark times are coming.”

Alec nods. War is a rumbling storm cloud on the horizon; he can feel it too. This is what he has trained for his whole life, what he was born for. And in a leadership role like he has now, he can’t afford to be compromised. This is the gift she’s given him: A warrior’s heart cannot be broken. “I understand,” he says. His voice is steady.

“Good.” Maryse stands, lifts her chin and puts on a familiar expressionless mask. It’s comforting, in a way. Alec realizes then that Magnus was right. There are more important things at stake. There is simply no space for love.

“Alec,” Maryse says, sharp. “When you’re struck down in battle, what do you do?”

Alec stands, too, tucks his hands behind his back and squares his shoulders: at attention. “Get back up,” he responds easily. Take a moment to assess the damage, tend to any wounds if necessary, then get back up again. Always.

“That’s right.” Her face softens again and she reaches up to tuck her fingers beneath his chin. “You fight for him Alec. Love is the _only_ thing worth fighting for.”

Alec stands frozen for several minutes after she leaves, thinking through what she’d said. Then he goes to his bathroom to find antiseptic and gauze and medical tape. He wraps his hand, and after a beat of hesitation, he activates his healing rune to speed up the process. Punishing himself isn’t the answer. Magnus taught him that, too.

There’s another knock on the door. This time it’s Clary. In the not-so-distant past Clary Fairchild would have been the last person in any realm he’d want to see in this moment, but Alec likes to think he’s become a softer, more patient person these days. Clary looks rough for the wear too, with red marks still standing out against her pale neck in the shape of handprints, her eyes a little wide and wild from shock. Her right hands shakes. She presses it against her hip.

“Are you okay?” Alec asks.

“No.” She laughs, though nothing at all is funny. “Are you?”

He gives the same incredulous laugh. “No.”

“Wanna spar? I hear we should probably be in battle-ready shape.”

And this he can do, this he can focus on. Then he’ll feel the things he needs to feel. And he’ll make them better. He’ll find a way because he and Magnus somehow always do. He’s in for the fight of his life, but he doesn’t have to do it alone. Alec gestures, _after you_ , and follows Clary from the room.


End file.
